Heartbreaking goodbye to lifelong love
AS NEIL Young so eloquently put it, “there comes a time” with everything in life when you have to say goodbye.
Toowoomba man Ted Arundel, 82, gets teary when he thinks about auctioning his antique collection of 70 years.
Since losing his wife, Ruth, 18 months ago, he’s decided it’s time to say goodbye to the collection he started at just 12.
Known around town as an avid collector, Mr Arundel said this would be one of Toowoomba’s biggest antique auctions to date.
“It was an interest that turned into a hobby and a hobby that turned into a business and now it’s time to say goodbye,” he said.
When Mr Arundel was a little boy and would visit his grandparents in Brisbane where he was surrounded by crockery and furniture that would eventually become antiques.
Originally from a farm, when Mr Arundel visited he had to adapt a life of ties, tails and polished shoes whenever he sat at the dining table.
“It was a value instilled in us to have a respect for these things and it evolved from there,” he said.
As a farmer, Mr Arundel
liked to keep busy. When he grew up and moved to Toowoomba, he found himself pacing up and down Ruthven St at 10pm looking for something to do.
This was when his interest turned into a hobby. He remembers
attending an antique sale in Drayton where he bought some items he had never seen before and has never seen since.
“That’s when the egg hatched and I thought ‘I could purse this a little further,” he said.
Mr Arundel and his wife ended up running antique shops in both Toowoomba and Brisbane.
The upcoming auction has items like the nine Shelley tea sets, expected to send the keenest antique collectors into a frenzy. Bidders will travel from all over the state.
Toowoomba Auction Centre will host the auction on Saturday, May 6 at 6 Cumners Rd, Torrington from 9am.
An inspection of items will be held the day before.